| The Flower Bowl came in two sizes,
an eight and nine-inch diameter. The bowls also came
with a black base, which was probably made of ebony.
The candlesticks that were made in 1925 had a ring
handle. The candlesticks without handles, as shown,
were identical to the 1925 candlesticks but were
made sometime later. Other pieces from a 1925 catalog
are shown on page 13. Another page from the 1925
catalog is given on the rear cover.
A 1924 BRUSH-McCOY CATALOG PAGE
At this point I would like to offer
a little discussion of onyx. All of the pieces that
are called onyx are not the same type onyx. Also,
sometimes there is confusion in determining if a
particular piece is onyx or if it has a blended glaze.
Both the onyx ware and pieces with a blended glaze
are created using a procedure called over-glazing.
In this process, a second color, or sometimes a third
color glaze, is applied to an initially glazed piece.
Although in both of the two
types of over-glazing the glazes blend together, a difference occurs because
of the manner in which the second and any subsequent glaze is applied.
In creating blended ware an additional color or
colors may be applied by using a brush, or more typically,
if one color is added, by dipping the top of the
piece in the additional glaze. Subsequently, when
the piece is up-righted and fired all added glazes
run down the sides of the ware for varying distances
and the colors tend to blend in streaks.
In
the early onyx pieces the secondary color
or colors are stippled all over the ware.
Stippling is a method of applying color by
daubing the tip of a brush loaded with a
colored glaze at intervals all around the
sides of the ware. This produces a pattern,
shown to the right below, that is sometimes
more noticeable than at other times.
The
major difference seen between
blended ware and the earlier onyx ware is
that in onyx ware the secondary color or
colors are renewed at spots all over the
sides of the ware so that the over-glaze
or glazes are not confined to streaks. Since
both blended ware and onyx ware are glazed
by hand, each piece is unique and there are
many variations of each style of them. |
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In
December 1925 the name of the pottery was
changed from the Brush-McCoy Pottery to the
Brush Pottery. Four years later, in 1929,
the company came out with another onyx line.
It was called “Modern Blended
Onyx”, and the glaze was applied to the
company’s Stonecraft Line, which had
first been introduced in 1923. It is not known
whether this new “Modern Blended Onyx” was
applied to any other pieces or not, but a Stonecraft
jardinière with the new glaze is shown
to the left. While the upper portion of the
jardinière has a solid color glaze,
the lower sides which is the onyx portion,
are clearly typical of the blended glaze technique. |
Although
this new line, Modern Blended Onyx, was solely
a Brush Pottery Co. product, the date it came
out, 1929, is important because it marks the
time that a noticeable difference between the
original type onyx and a newer type appeared.
The question
may be asked, “Why was there
a change in the way onyx pieces were made?” The
most probably reason for the change began years before.
In 1921, the U.S. War Department conducted an investigation
to determine which minerals had been in short supply
during World War I. The list of minerals included
tin, which was an important ingredient contained
in onyx glazes. This metal, together with lead caused
the original onyx glaze to be heavy and thick, and
to have deep and very rich colors. In addition, their
use created an excellent blending of the different
colored glazes to occur. Although the U.S. Government
did not begin a program to stockpile the minerals
that were identified earlier until 1939, the minerals
undoubtedly were scarce and expensive years before
then.
It appears
that due to the scarcity of tin, and its expense,
a substitute formula for the onyx was developed.
Lead used by itself results in a clear glaze
that shows colors well and has depth, but tin
was needed to make the old onyx. When lead is
combined with tin oxide in proportions of about
one part lead to three parts tin, the glaze takes
on the onyx characteristics. In the new formula
it is not certain if the use of lead was discontinued
at this time, but titanium dioxide was substituted
for the more scarce tin oxide. The result of
the change was a thinner glaze and one which
did not produce the deep rich colors and the
superb blending as before. For example, the earlier
reddish, dark brown that was called “Red Onyx” was
now a lighter brown.
There is another difference too. Typically on the
older onyx pieces the glaze blending goes down the
sides of the piece to the very bottom. The secondary
glaze, or glazes, on the latest onyx pieces stops
short and does not extend to the bottom. To the left
above is an example of a latter day Brush-McCoy piece,
and in the center and to the right are two examples
of latter day Nelson McCoy pieces. I will discuss
more about the Nelson McCoy pottery onyx pieces below.
| Since some of the glaze would
run off the piece in the older type onyx, it
could cause a sticking problem within the kiln
when the piece was fired. To remedy this problem
additional manufacturing steps had to be
adopted. |
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In order to eliminate sticking
to the kiln plate, or sagger (a large ceramic
box that
holds the pieces as they are being fired), each piece was placed on a pontil.
A pontil is simply a small devise consisting of a base with three small, pointed
vertical stilts that are positioned in a triangular shape. These stilts raise
the piece above the plate or sagger floor so any excess glaze can drip off and
permit the piece to be removed after firing without it sticking. |
The
use of a pontil causes the base of the
pieces to be irregular due to the varying
amount of fired glaze clinging around the
edge of the base. Therefore, the base of
each piece was placed on a grinding wheel
and smoothed so that the piece would sit
upright. The grinding creates an unglazed
ring, or sometimes a partially unglazed
ring, around the perimeter of the base.
Additionally,
since the points of the stilts are surrounded
by glaze when the piece they support is fired,
each stilt leaves a small spot on the bottom
when the stilt is removed from the piece.
These marks which resemble little popped
blisters are called pontil marks. In the
photo to left may be seen the three evenly
spaced marks around the inside perimeter. |
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In
the early 1930’s,
after the onyx glaze formula was changed the
severity of the sticking problem was decreased,
since the secondary glaze(s) did flow all of
the way to and off the bottom of the pieces.
This
allowed the use of the pontil to be discontinued.
Care was still necessary however, to prohibit
the primary glaze from sticking, but alternative
methods were available. |
One
method was to scrape the glaze off the bottom
of each piece before firing, but a faster
and better way was soon adopted. This method
involved the use of hot wax. According to
Nelson McCoy, this method was used by his
pottery, and it is assumed that it was used
by the Brush-McCoy pottery too.
In this method, e ach dipper or glaze person
had a hot plate and skillet that contained
a piece of carpet that had a certain knap and
thickness, and lots of wax. The dipper would
lower each bisque piece into the wax soaked
carpet to a depth just enough to coat the very
bottom of each piece. On pieces that had a
bottom with a concave center surrounded by
a raised outer ring, the wax would just be
applied to the outer ring. On other flat-bottom
pieces, the wax would cover the entire bottom.
After the wax was applied the piece was fired.
During the firing the wax eliminated any sticking
and it would burn away leaving no trace.
It was necessary that the dipper kept the
wax at a certain height in the hot skillet,
because if too little wax was applied to the
foot, the piece would catch glaze and stick,
and if there was too much wax, the piece would
have a bare place on the side where there was
no glaze.
Besides the lack of pontil marks on the newer
type onyx, there is one other difference between
the older and newer onyx pieces. The older
pieces were made using a yellowish, colored
clay, whereas the newer pieces were made using
a white or cream-colored clay.
As time went on the Brush pottery continued making
onyx pieces throughout the years of its existence,
but as mentioned above, the J.W. McCoy, Brush-McCoy,
and the Brush potteries were not the only makers
of onyx ware. After the name of the Nelson McCoy
Sanitary Stoneware Co. was changed in 1933 to
the Nelson McCoy Pottery Co., they also produced
an onyx line.
It
is believed that the onyx formula Nelson
McCoy first used was the thick glaze formula
that had the rich coloring, just as the
J.W. McCoy and Brush-McCoy potteries used.
A 1933 Nelson McCoy catalog page showing
the shape of the pieces the pottery initially
made is given on page 14. Information does
not exist to showing a subsequent grouping
of Nelson McCoy onyx pieces. However, a
number of individual pieces, mainly jardinières
and vases, are known to have been produced.
Compared
to solid colored pottery, or pottery with
blended colors, the production of onyx,
as has been shown, is a more labor-intensive
operation. For this reason, or a decreased demand,
or some other cause, the Nelson McCoy pottery
only made onyx pieces for a few years, probably
less than three or four. After that time, the
production of blended glazes became the multi-glaze
method of choice. Along with this glazing style
and the use of solid colored glazes, in both
bright and matte shades, the Nelson McCoy pottery
produced many other innovative glazing styles
throughout the life of the pottery.
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J.W.
McCoy produced the first known onyx pieces in 1910.
The pieces he made were a ardinière, a matching
pedestal, and an umbrella stand as shown to the left
and in the center below. All of these pieces were
offered in both a “Red
Onyx”, which was actually a reddish dark brown color, and in a blended
glaze. 
